The automatic application of closures, caps or lids to filled containers at high speeds has become a standard feature of filling lines for the food, beverage and pharmaceutical industries. In many instances, the closures to be applied are of relatively shallow disc-shaped configuration having one planar end face and the opposite end face having a recessed configuration to engage the neck of the container. It is obviously necessary that successive closures being fed into automatic filling machines be oriented so that the recessed side or each successive closure is disposed in the proper orientation so that the cap applicating mechanism can apply the successive closures to the neck portions of successive containers.
Devices have heretofore been proposed for effecting such orientation but have not been generally satisfactory because they, in the most part, rely upon the interaction of relatively movable elements, such as pivoted flippers, or the like, which engage the improperly oriented closures and effect a reversal of such closures. When processing speeds on the order of three thousand units per minute are required, these devices have proven to be completely ineffective because the flipping mechanism cannot function that fast to effect the proper orientation of a misoriented closure. Typical of such prior art devices is that shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,741,366.